CHANGING ROLE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27386, 11 May 1950, Page 10

CHANGING ROLE

Trade Union Movement The changing role of the 'trade unions in industrial society was the substance of a talk’ given by Mrs K. A. Blakey to 10 members of the WEA last night. Mrs Blakey spoke mainly on the English trade union movement, which, she said, had reached the mature and unified stage not yet attained in New Zealand. “The movement in Britain today has tremendous power,” she said, “ and the rank and file are generally loyal to the leaders. That loyalty has become something that is instinctive.”

The speaker said that the trade unions had advanced from their old fighting days into organisations of constructive thought and action. The way in which the British ■ unions had used their strength during the war and in the post-war era was encouraging. The part that Mr Bevin had taken in the Ministry of Labour had done a lot for the prestige of the trade union movement.

A problem was the great division be tween the informed leaders in any movement and the vast mass that followed on, Mrs Blakey said. In Britain the unions were making an attempt to inform the rank and file of membershin by the distribution of journals and other means. Such a campaign was just as important in New Zealand as it was in Britain. Compulsory unionism had meant that a lot of the crusading spirit had gone out of the movement, she said. Unions should do more for the ordinary girl or boy going into industry by showing them what the union had done for them and what they could do for the union.